Technical Field
The present invention relates to a shift lever device for operating an automatic transmission of a vehicle.
Related Art
There are shift lever devices having a shift lever that is rotated by the driver and a detent mechanism for restricting the rotation of the shift lever. At the shift lever, a shift button is mounted to a knob that the driver grasps, and the rotation restriction by the detent mechanism is canceled interlockingly with operation of the shift button. The driving mode of the automatic transmission is switched due to, in the state in which the driver operates the shift button this way, the driver rotating the shift lever and placing the shift lever at a predetermined range.
Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open (JP-A) No. 2010-195398 discloses a shift lever having a rotating-type shift button. This shift lever has a lever main body that is hollow and shaped as a shaft, a knob that is hollow and is provided at the distal end portion of the lever main body, a shift button that is rotatably mounted to the knob, and a rod that is inserted-through the interior of the lever main body. At this shift lever, due to operation of the shift button, the rod is lowered accompanying the rotating of the shift button, and the rotation restriction by the detent mechanism is cancelled.
If the rotation stroke amount of the shift button that is needed in order to obtain a given rod stroke amount is large, a large space is needed in order to permit operation of the shift button, and this leads to the shift lever becoming large. Compactness of the shift button is demanded from the standpoint of design, and, in order to satisfy this demand, it is good to be able to make the ratio of the rotation stroke amount of the shift button with respect to the rod stroke amount be small. From this standpoint, there may be room for further improvement at the shift lever device of JP-A No. 2010-195398.